Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 2.djvu/348

296 man to every house, who could have any share in the government, (the rest consisting of women, children, and servants) and making other obvious abatements, these tyrants, if they had been careful to adhere together, might have been a majority even of the people collective.

In the time of the second Punick war, the balance of power in Carthage was got on the side of the people; and this to a degree, that some authors reckon the government to have been then among them a dominatio plebis, or tyranny of the commons; which it seems they were at all times apt to fall into, and was at last among the causes, that ruined their state: and the frequent murders of their generals, which Diodorus tells us was grown to an established custom among them, may be another instance, that tyranny is not confined to numbers.

I shall mention but one example more among a great number, that might be produced; it is related by the author last cited. The orators of the people at Argos (whether you will style them in modern phrase, great speakers of the house; or only, in general, representatives of the people collective) stirred up the commons against the nobles, of whom 1600 were murdered at once; and at last, the orators themselves, because they left off their accusations, or, to speak intelligibly, because they withdrew their impeachments; having, it seems, raised a spirit they were not able to lay. And this last circumstance, as cases have lately stood, may perhaps be worth noting. From